Victor Lustig - Later Years

Later Years

Later, Lustig convinced Al Capone to invest $50,000 in a stock deal. Lustig kept Capone's money in a safe deposit box for two months, then returned it to him, claiming that the deal had fallen through. Impressed with Lustig's integrity, Capone gave him $5,000. It was, of course, all that Lustig was after.

In 1930, Lustig went into partnership with a middle-aged chemist from Nebraska named Tom Shaw. Shaw had the job of engraving plates for the manufacture of counterfeit banknotes. They then organised a counterfeit ring for the purpose of circulating the hundreds of thousands of forged notes throughout the country. Lustig was successful in keeping it a secret by making sure that not even the underlings knew anything about it.

On the evening of 10 May 1935, Lustig was arrested by federal agents on charges of counterfeiting after an anonymous phone call was made, out of jealousy, by his mistress Billy May, who became jealous when she learned of the romance between him and Shaw's young mistress Marie. Secret agents swooped on Lustig who had a briefcase on him at the time. Opening the briefcase, they found only expensive clothing, but in his wallet they found a key. Lustig refused to specify where it came from, but it eventually led the agents to a locker in the Times Square subway station which contained $51,000 in counterfeit bills and the plates from which they had been printed. The day before his trial, he managed to escape from the Federal House of Detention in New York City, but was recaptured 27 days later in Pittsburgh. Lustig pleaded guilty at his trial and was sentenced to 20 years in Alcatraz Island, California. On March 9, 1947, he contracted pneumonia and died two days later at the Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri. On his death certificate his occupation was listed as "apprentice salesman."